Funny Menu Mistakes Around the World

From “spitted” pizza to crap omelettes, navigating a menu while traveling can be a lesson in local culture—or its own form of dinner theater.

From “spitted” pizza to crap omelettes, navigating a menu while traveling can be a lesson in local culture—or its own form of dinner theater.

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Katrina Brown Hunt

Suzanne Wenz loved one meal in Barcelona so much that she took the menu home with her. It wasn’t so much for the food as it was for the delightfully comedic, Catalan-meets-English listings. “It included a delicious Attack of Chick Peas and for dessert, Strawberries & Scum,” says the executive from Boston’s Fairmont Copley Plaza. “Of course we had to order it, and I kept the menu as a little souvenir. I always appreciate the effort of a small restaurant to translate their menu into English.”

No doubt, one of the best ways to experience a culture when you’re traveling is to eat in the mom-and-pop, hole-in-wall restaurants, where you can be served the most authentic local cuisine—as well as some of the funniest, most charming, or downright confusing culinary descriptions. Thanks to the well-meaning but non-English-speaking menu scribe, “crab” can easily become “crap,” or “deviled” eggs may be rendered “demonic.” And that advertised “dog menu”…is it a listing of items that a local canine might enjoy for supper, or suppers created using local canines?

What’s a confused diner to do? Perhaps as no surprise, your smartphone can offer some help: the app Word Lens uses your phone’s camera as a scanner to translate French, Spanish, or Italian into English.

Granted, plenty of mangled menus are written by and for English speakers, while other menu problems come from idioms that just don’t translate. While in France, Maryland-based travel writer Judy Colbert thought she was playing it safe to order an American Sandwich, only to learn that it was raw hamburger meat.

And in Turkey recently, New York public relations exec Sherry Smith was puzzled to see Salmon Fog on the menu. She wondered if they meant smoked salmon, she says. “But apparently şiş—pronounced ‘shish’—also means ‘fog’ in Turkish—so it was simply salmon shish kebab.”

There was one another menu item that baffled her too: “Fish Intestine Casserole—I hope that was a mistranslation.”

We’ve rounded up some of the funniest menu mistakes photographed around the world. See for yourself, and if you’ve come across any in your travels, upload the photos to our community and let us in on the joke.

1 of 25baxter images / Alamy

201212-w-funny-menus-deeffied-fish

If you get squeamish about raw seafood, worry not: the “fisk” here has been thoroughly deep-died for your convenience.

201212-w-funny-menus-fried-bum

201212-w-funny-menus-whole-meat-toast

Perfect for the traveler looking for the ultimate high-protein breakfast. (And do try your whole-meat toast with the marmalade.)

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11 of 25黒忍者

201212-w-funny-menus-bacon-butty

The Brits have a hard enough time selling their quaint foods to newcomers even when typed correctly. Take bacon butty, for instance, or, not pictured here, the dreaded spotted dick (a kind of suet pudding). Bubble and Squead—instead of Squeak—may actually be an aesthetic improvement.

201212-w-funny-menus-childrens-menu

201212-w-funny-menus-dishes-with-beef

Do you feel a little intruded upon when waiters come sing “Happy Birthday” really loudly at your table? Then you probably wouldn’t like that “forcemeat.” Or how that stake gets turned into “dried dread.”

201212-w-funny-menus-spitted-pizza

201212-w-funny-menus-shakey-beef

Ever woken up in the middle of the night with the sudden knowledge that you’ve become possessed, in a sense, by that dinner from a few hours ago? Perhaps “shakey” is how you’ll feel after the exorcism of demonic beef cubes.

201212-w-funny-menus-spic-fried

We know that hangover remedies vary from country to country. Here in Cambodia, if you’ve done “battle” with your beer, you might try a nice, rehydrating Fanta alongside a comforting plate of deep-fried porn.